Thursday, November 27, 2008

Surprisingly, she kept her cool despite hearing the crackling of fire in the basement. “This is it,’ she thought, ‘do or die time.’ She knew she had the answer and she knew it was not in her consciousness. Once again she imagined herself meditating and once again she was instantly in a state in a deep relaxed state. The image of her friend Diane stood in front of her. ‘What you want is through that door.’ Diane said as she pointed at a dark door behind her. Therese ran to the door and tried to open it but it did not budge. ‘You must open it with your desire, your will, your intent.’ Therese tried again but the door did not budge. She look back to her friend and asked: ‘What do I need to do ?’ A tone of desperation was creeping into her voice. ‘I already told you,’ Diane replied, ‘use your desire.’ Flames began to appear all around. Therese turned to the door and tried one more time. ‘God please,’ she screamed, ‘open this damn door.’ The door did not open. She pushed again, this time screaming ‘I want to live.’ The door opened. She found herself standing in the kitchen, smoke was pouring up from the basement and it was hot, stiflingly hot. The air burned in her lungs. ‘Oh my god,’ she thought, ‘I ‘m alive. I am breathing.’ A wave of happiness washed over her. Then she saw the table and her body still laying on it. ‘The knife,’she said, ‘I have to pull out the knife.’ She rushed over to the body, grabbed the knife and for some strange reason, she looked into the body’s eyes. She gasped. They were empty. And then . . . She found herself back in her body, looking out at an empty kitchen still unable to move. She pictured herself meditating again and instantly found herself looking at a now open door. A voice from behind her said: ‘Whatever you do, don’t look at your own eyes again. If you do you will surely die.’ She did not recognize the voice but she did not care to find out who said those words. She just wanted to live. Again she went through the door. Again she found herself in the kitchen, staring at the body on the table. Flames were coming through the door to the basement. The heat was unbearable. She grabbed for knife and screamed as it burned her hands. She could not pull it out. The knife was too hot to hold. She was too late. At that point, she panicked. She ran through the kitchen door into the parlor. The whole house was full of smoke and parts of the floor were on fire. She ran to the front door, turned the knob and pushed her way to freedom. The cold night air shocked her system back into thinking. She thought about going back in and looked through the doorway at the parlor. The kitchen was engulfed in flames. and the furniture was starting to burn. It was too late. At that moment a curious thing happened. Therese’s consciousness split into three parts. In one part, she felt herself lying on the kitchen table, her body convulsing vainly fighting to keep from burning. He had been wrong. She did feel the pain of burning and it was horrible. In the second part, she was standing in the doorway of the house’s front door looking in at the burning parlor and feeling helpless. And in the third part, she was inside of herself, somewhere looking at both scenes, the kitchen and the doorway. ‘You have to choose,’ a voice from behind her said, ‘which will it be ?’ She wanted to turn around and face this voice but she found herself unable to move. This mysterious voice was the same voice that had told her not to look into her own eyes. It was not his voice. This voice was much colder sounding as if it came from something not human. ‘You must choose now.’ The voice demanded. ‘Life or death.’ ‘I choose life,’ she whispered. Her voice was raw from inhaling smoke. She was standing in the doorway watching the house burn in front of her. She was alive and she was in shock. She ran from the house silently, not looking back, not even when she heard the first explosion. Not long after that fire engines came screaming down the street, one after another, blaring their horns and flashing their lights. She kept running. She did not want to be found. She did not want to be seen. Her magic eyes helped her navigate in the moonless night and she kept whispering to herself a single phrase over and over - ‘I choose life ’. Somewhere, miles later, she stopped, both running and talking. And fainted.

2 comments:

I am amazed at how much you are writing on this novel. I have never seen you so focused. You wake up at night and talk about the next part of the novel. I admit parts of the story are a little creepy to me but the integration of positive, somewhat spiritual tones throughout the story ease that dark edge I feel. Story keeps me interested, on the edge of my seat, always wondering.This novel I could see you publishing and I hope you do!!!!!BevCharacter named Diane, hm, how interesting.